Why does text disappear when I type?

Have you ever started to type and then see your words starting to delete the sentence in front of them? Usually when you type in the middle of a sentence, Word inserts the new letters between the existing words – it pushes them to the right of the page as you type.

However… sometimes Word eats up the existing material as you type in new words. 

9 times out of 10 this is because Overtype was turned on by accident. Overtype, as the name implies, types over other words. You can tell if Overtype is turned on, by looking at the status bar (horizontal bar at bottom of screen) and seeing if OVR is turned on.


There are two ways to turn it off:

  1. From the Tools menu, click Options, click the Edit tab, and then clear the Overtype mode checkbox.

    Why does text disappear when I type

  2. Double-click OVR on the status bar to turn it on or off.   

     

Hiding Text

Select the text you want to hide.  Click Format, Font, and then the Font tab. Select the Hidden checkbox.  Note that while ‘hidden’ text is displayed onscreen it will not be printed out. Hidden text is highlighted with underlines beneath the text.